From wrecking your workouts to sabotaging your sleep, stress can wreak havoc on your life. But it can also be energizing, motivating and life changing—if you embrace it. That’s the theory behind a new book called The Upside of Stress: Why Stress Is Good for You and How to Get Good At It, by Kelly McGonigal, PhD, a lecturer at Stanford University.
Shake loose using these tips:
- Repeat This Phrase: “I’m Excited”
When you start stressing, call on a motivating mantra. Tell yourself you’re excited, says McGonigal. In one study cited by McGonigal, researchers put participants through stressful situations, like mock job interviews, and evaluated their bodies’ responses. Before the interviews, each participant watched one of two videos about stress. One presented stress as an “enhancing” chance to learn and grow, and as something that could be helpful to job performance. The other video claimed that stress was more debilitating to both health and work-related performance than people thought. The purpose: To analyze how the videos affected participants’ levels of cortisol and dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA), two stress hormones.
- Keep Your Eye on the Prize
When you’re feeling overwhelmed, thinking of the long-term benefits of your situation might help. “You can deal with stressful life experiences with strength from past ones,” says McGonigal. One study out of Hope College showed that after two minutes of thinking of the positive outcomes of a tough experience, participants felt happier and more in control of their lives. So when you’re freaking out about a presentation because you’re certain you’ll bomb, remember that you’ll learn from the experience, no matter how terrible or awesome.
- Make a Stress Playlist
A group fitness instructor on the side, McGonigal loves making playlists to help her power past rough patches — just like she does to help her get through a workout. “Exercise is a way of practicing being good at stress. It’s uncomfortable, but there’s also the payoff,” says McGonigal. Create a list of songs that would hype you up if you were an Olympic athlete about to compete. “In the moment, when you’re feeling overwhelmed by stress, put on one of those songs. Research shows music can shift the physiology of your stress response and increase your confidence,” says McGonigal.
- Remember That Stress = Meaning
Even though stress is scary, it helps make life more worthwhile. “One study found that people who have meaningful lives also experience more stress, any way you want to measure it,” says McGonigal. Researchers let participants define “meaning” however they liked, but summed it up as a life with “purpose and value.” The study authors found that people who had experienced the most stressful events were also the most likely to think they led meaningful lives. Sure, you could try to completely eradicate stress from your life, but you’d also be erasing most of what’s meaningful along with it. Instead, open your arms, embrace stress, and use it to your benefit.
